They fall through the portal in a rough tumble, tripping over each other and even Cass in Percy’s head is spinning at the sudden shift. When they pull themselves upright and apart, all of them dusting each other off they can see: a rough track in front of them, well trodden with recent footprints, hemmed in on both sides by thickly-growing, sharp-thorned brambles. The bushes rise high, almost a forest, and even the heavy trees here seem to have thorns on the trunks, same as those of the Bramblewood.
Discerning their likely target isn’t too difficult though - off in the distance, down the trackway they can see, a dark gothic tower looms tall against the distant starscape of the sky.
“Oh my,” Percy says weakly. “It’s almost like being home.”
Haven’t watched Critical Role season 3, but I’m 99% certain that Laudna’s warlock Patron (and/or sorcerous bloodline) is the Dread Emperor, aka the bad guy that Vox Machina fought pre-stream and during whose boss fight Keyleth ended up accidentally killing one of his kid hostages.
#2 - So! I yelled about this idea recently to @burr-ell, @crithaus and @blorbologist because I was going over some early, pre-stream campaign stuff and it collided with my New Blorbo thoughts and.
And.
Kash was identified as Vesh's chosen because he had yellow eyes as a child. At some point one of his eyes turned blue, we don't know when, why, or how, but given that both his eyes being yellow was the mark of him being chosen I am inclined to think that one eye turning blue was a consequence of his vehement, violent rejection of Vesh during the Sting when he realised what she was. I think it botched the connection they were meant to have and consequently messed with his "chosen" status, and thus his eyes.
Anyway. In our world, eye colour significance varies drastically based on culture and is much more meaningless than in Exandria, a world where instantaneous communication and transportation have been possible for absolutely ages, and where gods and godly entities have been known, active parts of the world in extremely provable ways. In Exandria, a particular eye colour being specifically associated with a particular god is likely to be standout and specific and not overlap as it might in our world.
Further, yellow eyes aren't too far off golden eyes, and you know who else has yellow/golden eyes?
The Dread Emperor.
Yeah. The child-snatching evil wizard. The one who took the form of a child with golden eyes to lure in kids, and seemingly had golden eyes in his true form as well.
And the Dread Emperor is ancient. Exists primarily on his own demiplane. His exact nature is up for debate.
Vesh is also ancient - a possible warlock type for her, aside from Archfey, is Undying. She also retreats to her own demiplane between summonings. Her exact nature - if she's archfey, witch or something else, is also up for debate.
But the Dread Emperor is from The Book of Vile Darkness and Vesh is a creation of Will Friedle and these are entirely different origins...
But they both exist in Exandria and if they're in the same sandbox, I will play.
So- what if there is some connection there? What if the Dread Emperor was a past chosen? Hell, given the fact they've both been around for ages, what if he was the first chosen? If you wanted to you could give a similar backstory to Kash and make him almost sympathetic (albeit in the "cool story, still kidnapping and murder" kind of way) or you could just have them be awful exes. Three ideas I have so far are:
The Dread Emperor being a past chosen of Vesh, staying in his own demiplane to avoid Vesh, using a child form outside to avoid Vesh likewise, capturing children to try to regain a childhood lost to a cultish upbringing while also having the certainty of being a Chosen One to let him excuse being a godawful piece of shit.
A chosen who fled before consummation because he was told the truth, thus creating the reason chosen of Vesh (such as Kash) are kept in the dark as to Vesh's true nature and the real reason they're life (to balance her being death), and sought to increase his own power and independent evil so he wouldn't ever be shackled to another entity.
What if Vesh and the Dread Emperor are like... thousand-year exes? What if the Dread Emperor was her first chosen and she gave him too much power which is why he's proven so long lived and so powerful and then he abandoned her and that's why she's obsessed with yellow eyed kids as chosen ones.
It is important to note that the validity of all of these ideas is entirely speculative. But I think they're fun as possibilities and if the Dread Emperor did start out as a Chosen Mate of Vesh who rejected her, be that before or after the Sting, it might also explain why she murders all other followers around at the Sting (to isolate the Chosen so they only have her, standard cult isolation tactics) and why she murders chosen she feels are insufficiently faithful (to avoid having another superpowered rival with a magical link to her)
Just... the idea of two superpowered, acrimonious evil exes is incredibly entertaining to me. And it could fit! Which makes it even better.
send in “📓” and I’ll roll a d10 and ramble some worldbuilding thoughts
In the beginning, there was the Emperor, in the time beyond time, and a place beyond the nothing. The Emperor was young, and new to the task of creation, but anxious for a realm of his own. Thus it was that he formed for himself a blank space to hold such a thing – a plane to shape according to his desire. It was dark and cold, so the young Emperor passed between the realms of others to thieve lights for his newborn sky.
These were the stars, as different as the realms they'd been stolen from, in many hues to adorn the fledgeling void. Many burned with terrible heat, incandescent balls of lightning. Others hung like ethereal pearls, orbs of concentrated witchlight strung through the black with a song that needed no ear nor air to enter in.
It was beautiful, and for untold time, it remained a cosmic jewellery box. However, smaller spheres were caught in loops around some of those stars, and it was these that next caught the eye of the Emperor. His finesse was greater by then, as he nudged many of these either closer or farther from their lights, that the sweet waters he brought in from outside could flow beneath the skies he shrouded on like cloaks.
Upon one world, he wove a mighty enchantment, each little part becoming either sugarkind, or something to imitate it, in a lifeless wonderland of candy. On other worlds, he wove smaller such enchantments, only certain places carrying the signature of his favoured sweetness. It was magnificent, but he was discontented.
He seeded the waters and lands of his worlds with the beginnings of life from other places – he knew not how to set the first sparks, but he could mould them from there, far quicker than had he left them be. He directed them along paths he found pleasing, adding to their numbers here and there with more stolen wonders, until each cradle world bore areas of lushness. These, though, were deadly cradles, delicious succulence often concealing a vicious secret, or simple inedibility. Beautiful creatures, though some were mild, often possessed fonts of danger within.
Life teemed, and the Emperor was pleased, seeding some strains from the world of sweetness among the others on a whim – but there was still something missing. There was life, but nothing behind the eyes – no soul. From creatures across other realms, he tore away the souls of their hunted carcasses and spread these between his own creatures, awakening them.
The souled could then beget more, with fresh animal souls, or the souls of those creatures which pleased him best could be sent back remembering into the cycle to thrive with their experience. Eventually, some of those could experience a second awakening, but not for a long time yet. Others, on death, were gathered into a vault of souls, or imbued into trees, mountains and other such things to be further experience-seasoned.
After a while, the Emperor tried to create people, by imbuing rebirthed animal souls into varied people shapes he'd made – but they were not ready, and behaved as creatures do. Thus it was that he went out into the realms beyond again, this time walking among the mortals there. He offered bargains, deals and wishes – a sweet trickster going to where there was need. As is typical of those kin to demons, he never broke a deal – but equally, he always collected.
We bartered souls were clothed in new flesh at our deaths, both reflecting our old lives and these strange new worlds we arrived in, and set among the treacherous wonders. If we displease, our souls may be seasoned by life as a remembering but low creature, plant or tool, or cleansed and set into the cycle anew and unaware of our pasts. Those who please may be reborn in circumstances brighter, but all remain playthings of our Emperor. We know not what he wants with our souls, nor what becomes of the souls of those of our children who never make pact with him. Few dare ask, for ours is a Dread Emperor, amused by our cycling struggles and fond of adding fresh twists to them.
How do you spell the names of the dragons in the Chroma Conclave?
Per Matt’s tweet: Raishan (green), Umbrasyl (black), Vorugal (white), and Thordak (red).
Why did an attack roll of 15 hit Scanlan in Episode 52?
Because he needed to attune to Mythcarver, he likely had to remove his +2 Ring of Protection or his Coldsnap Leather Armor.
To the lovely critter who sent in Media References and other stats for a Critmas:
We appreciate the work, but we’re not tracking those for Critmases! We mostly focus on the stuff that happens in-game. Thanks, though!
Heads up, Gern has yet to be added in the character sheets
Noted.
Why is your All Rolls chart in Excel rather than in a database?
When we started, Google Docs and Sheets were easy to create, easy to store, and easy to share. Even now, they still are. There are four of us across three time zones, plus dozens of volunteers around the world. Finding a *simple* free database for everyone to use is harder than it sounds. While we would love to eventually have a legit, honest-to-goodness database in place one day, what we have has been working for now. Our attention is currently focused on content!
What are the Dread Emperor’s Stats?
We don’t know, that battle happened pre-stream. That said, if we ever catch up on our Monster Analyses from the show and people are legitimately interested, maybe we’ll consider exploring the Pathfinder monsters we’re aware of...
Hey, could you calculate max damage and average damage for Vox Machina, but only under these specific conditions?
As much as we might, theoretically, like to calculate every permutation of damage statistic for Vox Machina, the truth of the matter is that we just don’t have time. Calculating the maximum amount of damage for each member of Vox Machina took all of us, working together, a day and a half-and we’re still adding to it. We do our best to make a lot of our knowledge public so that all of you are able to access it and calculate some of your curiosities without needing to go through us first.
As a reminder, while you’re welcome to send in requests for “how many times someone said or did XYZ,” requests that require a full rewatch of the show will take a very long time to answer. If you’d like to volunteer to help with any of our Current Projects, please send an email to [email protected].
